Collateral Beauty

Retreating from life after a tragedy, a man questions the universe by writing to Love, Time and Death. Receiving unexpected answers, he begins to see how these things interlock and how even loss can reveal moments of meaning and beauty.

Opinion

From Library Staff

I didn't want to watch this movie, but when my husband asked me to, I eventually relented. I'm so glad I did. This journey was lighter than I expected even though I cried throughout the story. It was beautiful and worth the time watching it.

Comment

Will Smith is a great actor, and Collateral Beauty has an interesting premise, but I struggled to be interested in the film. I couldn't tell if Will Smith acted like he didn't care, or he really did not care.

It's a Wonderful Life for millennials. Very contrived plot: actors hired to play Love, Time and Death to save a man who lost his daughter; yet the whole cast pulled it off ! Smith/Norton/Pena are OK, but Mirren, Knightley, Winslet and Naomie Harris shine. We all saw Harris as Miss Money Penny in 007, check her out as the crack addict in Moonlight, wow! For those too young too see the original Wonderful Life with Jimmy Stewart et.al., list this as your next Xmas flick!

Fabulous movie about loss, grief, acceptance and love. Will Smith is fantastic as are the other actors. The story is well told about a man who cannot come to terms with a death in his family. Will Smith shows his acting skills with the profound grief he feels, it touched my heart.

This was a good movie to watch. It was a more of a family movie, christmas movie, and chick flick all put in one. This movie had an all star cast. I will agree it was a little difficult to follow the storyline. But of course it was a very good movie to watch.

From the comments, obviously not appreciated by many. For me, it was 'magic'. There was so much depth and understanding of emotional pain, and the journey 'back' from the depths of anger and not being able to come to terms with denial and acceptance. Yes, more appealing to women, yet a beautiful and welcome departure from the thrillers. It required one to be open to a bit of 'Peter Pan' imagination. My only 'problem' with this is ~ do I watch it again, or simply leave the 'magic' of the drama suffice? I just loved this one!

Quotes

Advertising is about illuminating how our products and services will improve people's lives. Now, how do we do that? Love. Time. Death. Now these three abstractions
connect every single human being on Earth. Everything that we covet, everything that we fear not having, everything that we ultimately end up buying is because at the end of the day we long for love, we wish we had more time, and we fear death.
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Best quote:
Howard: I've heard all of your platitudes. I got them, I know. "She's in a better place." And, "This is all a part of a master plan." Heard that one, too. Here's my favorite. "God looked down and saw the most beautiful rose, so beautiful that he picked it to have it in Heaven all for Himself." Then there's the science, biocentrism, and we're all living and dying in infinite universes all at the same time. And then the religion, ...